The forgers have discussed and decided that neutral raced characters within evil raced associations will not be allowed. Many reasons support this decision but the very main reason is that it does not support the TorilMUD theme that this game provides.

Just so you don't think we rushed into a decision, you should know that we discussed this issue at an open staff meeting instead of keeping it to the administration staff. I decided it was an important enough decision that it should not be made by just one sphere. We discussed it for a large portion of our meeting and the negatives (mostly long-term) outweigh the benefits (mostly short-term.)

Viclor Voddyn wrote:Only problem I can think of would be to mess up the racewar theme....

What race war theme? We're in a race war? I never would've noticed... If there isn't going to be pkill there is no point in seperating the races.

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Well if you go ahead and allow Ogres Warriors and Human Paladins to group together then why have alignment at all? Switch the whole system to an EQ'esque Faction Base. Then we will have Trolls in WD pissing in the fountain.

Grizz wrote:Well if you go ahead and allow Ogres Warriors and Human Paladins to group together then why have alignment at all? Switch the whole system to an EQ'esque Faction Base. Then we will have Trolls in WD pissing in the fountain.

how can a ogre warrior and a paladin group? but i do agree that the race wars do not exist

If there isn't PK, there isn't race wars. You've already blurred that line with allowing neutral and evil aligned, but neutral/good raced characters group with evils. Might as well allow it as guilds.

Not to jump on the bandwagon, but everyone regularly tells me how weird and perplexingly inconvenient it is to have a druid who, despite being neutral and casting the exact same spell as a human, cannot well to an evilrace. Whereas humans now can.

I could totally understand not allowing half-elves or elves to group with evils, but when it comes to casting the same spell it just looks goofy.

The human druid thing is to help out the human race, I believe, since they seem to be so downtrodden and nobody wanted to play them for so long. Same reason the much-argued "overpowered" khanjari has proc diarrhea in human hands?

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Grizz wrote:Well if you go ahead and allow Ogres Warriors and Human Paladins to group together then why have alignment at all? Switch the whole system to an EQ'esque Faction Base. Then we will have Trolls in WD pissing in the fountain.

how can a ogre warrior and a paladin group? but i do agree that the race wars do not exist

I guess I got a bit confused on the definition of "Evils" in some above statements. When I think of "Evils" I think of the race more often than the alignment.

If there isn't PK, there isn't race wars. You've already blurred that line with allowing neutral and evil aligned, but neutral/good raced characters group with evils. Might as well allow it as guilds.

This is where my confusion comes from. Is he suggesting that Guilds can be composed of Grey Elves and Drow Elves? Hence my statement.

If there isn't PK, there isn't race wars. You've already blurred that line with allowing neutral and evil aligned, but neutral/good raced characters group with evils. Might as well allow it as guilds.

Did i miss something? good aligned PC's, and classes that are good only
still cannot group with evils. Hence paladins/rangers/gnomes/dwarves/
grey elves/even half elves and halflings cannot group with them. Evil
race was thrown a bone since they had dwindling numbers. The neutral
and evil aligned humans can group with them so they can still be
zoneable. This doesn't mean there is complete trust between the humans
and evilraces. I would imagine that this is one of those rules that could
be broken on occasion with a good RP reason with a story, and perhaps
some individual questing. Bottom line is, you are all reading into this WAY
too far.

Ashiwi wrote:The human druid thing is to help out the human race, I believe, since they seem to be so downtrodden and nobody wanted to play them for so long. Same reason the much-argued "overpowered" khanjari has proc diarrhea in human hands?

If you read Lilithelle's posts on the subject, this transforms humans from an unpopular but good choice for druid (due to more hps, they are arguably the best for high-end zoning even without the change) to the hands-down best choice. Did you see how many human druids were rolled immediately following the change? While humans as a whole gained from being able to GROUP with evils, and I noted that I had nothing against that, I don't see why the moonwell SPELL should suddenly differentiate between humans, halfelves, and elves casting it. It just seems ridiculous.

By all means, disallow grouping between elves and evils for RP reasons. Disallow grouping between halfelves and evils for reasons of balance. But a tremendous number of evilraces and goodraces have expressed their frustration at my inability to well to evilraces. It makes everyone's lives more complicated.

Moving more towards the original thrust of this thread, Delmair appears to have captured the imms ideas pretty nicely - they don't intend to allow open grouping; they just want to revitalize the human race and evils by giving them the perks of OC without the pitfalls.

Ashiwi wrote:The human druid thing is to help out the human race, I believe, since they seem to be so downtrodden and nobody wanted to play them for so long. Same reason the much-argued "overpowered" khanjari has proc diarrhea in human hands?

If you read Lilithelle's posts on the subject, this transforms humans from an unpopular but good choice for druid (due to more hps, they are arguably the best for high-end zoning even without the change) to the hands-down best choice. Did you see how many human druids were rolled immediately following the change? While humans as a whole gained from being able to GROUP with evils, and I noted that I had nothing against that, I don't see why the moonwell SPELL should suddenly differentiate between humans, halfelves, and elves casting it. It just seems ridiculous.

By all means, disallow grouping between elves and evils for RP reasons. Disallow grouping between halfelves and evils for reasons of balance. But a tremendous number of evilraces and goodraces have expressed their frustration at my inability to well to evilraces. It makes everyone's lives more complicated.

Moving more towards the original thrust of this thread, Delmair appears to have captured the imms ideas pretty nicely - they don't intend to allow open grouping; they just want to revitalize the human race and evils by giving them the perks of OC without the pitfalls.

Okay, first of all, Mori (and ya know I love ya! :P ) I am having a difficult time understanding why you don't understand how a neutral human gate/moonwell can be used by evilraces (last I checked, there was still a moonwell bug making them unenterable by evilraces even when cast by a human, but hey, what do I know *shrug*) but evilraces can't use the same spells from completely goodrace races. Um, evilraces already have the gate spell that can't be used by goodraces, and vice versa. Why wasn't this a problem for ya before? :shock:

As for humans being the best druid race, um... I disagree. Druids are reknowned for their twinking abilities, and it's all about the innate outdoor sneak, baby. Show me one human druid who can do that.

Birile wrote:As for humans being the best druid race, um... I disagree. Druids are reknowned for their twinking abilities, and it's all about the innate outdoor sneak, baby. Show me one human druid who can do that.

Birile wrote:As for humans being the best druid race, um... I disagree. Druids are reknowned for their twinking abilities, and it's all about the innate outdoor sneak, baby. Show me one human druid who can do that.

Verarb.

Bah. I was speaking strictly of the innate outdoor sneak ability, not the less stylish sneak from item sneak (or at least, that's what I'm assuming Verarb has :P ). Sheesh!

Ashiwi wrote:The human druid thing is to help out the human race, I believe, since they seem to be so downtrodden and nobody wanted to play them for so long. Same reason the much-argued "overpowered" khanjari has proc diarrhea in human hands?

If you read Lilithelle's posts on the subject, this transforms humans from an unpopular but good choice for druid (due to more hps, they are arguably the best for high-end zoning even without the change) to the hands-down best choice. Did you see how many human druids were rolled immediately following the change? While humans as a whole gained from being able to GROUP with evils, and I noted that I had nothing against that, I don't see why the moonwell SPELL should suddenly differentiate between humans, halfelves, and elves casting it. It just seems ridiculous.

By all means, disallow grouping between elves and evils for RP reasons. Disallow grouping between halfelves and evils for reasons of balance. But a tremendous number of evilraces and goodraces have expressed their frustration at my inability to well to evilraces. It makes everyone's lives more complicated.

Moving more towards the original thrust of this thread, Delmair appears to have captured the imms ideas pretty nicely - they don't intend to allow open grouping; they just want to revitalize the human race and evils by giving them the perks of OC without the pitfalls.

Okay, first of all, Mori (and ya know I love ya! :P ) I am having a difficult time understanding why you don't understand how a neutral human gate/moonwell can be used by evilraces (last I checked, there was still a moonwell bug making them unenterable by evilraces even when cast by a human, but hey, what do I know *shrug*) but evilraces can't use the same spells from completely goodrace races. Um, evilraces already have the gate spell that can't be used by goodraces, and vice versa. Why wasn't this a problem for ya before? :shock:

As for humans being the best druid race, um... I disagree. Druids are reknowned for their twinking abilities, and it's all about the innate outdoor sneak, baby. Show me one human druid who can do that.

Cheers!

Because the nature of the effect was different. They create different portals. I thought it was a little hokey but accepted that it was necessary to prevent goods from hopping an evil portal and racing them to a rare or such, and vice versa. I guess it would be a little less annoying to me if the moonwells looked different, because at least then everyone would know which was which.

Your comments about outdoor sneak only pertain to elves vs. humans, and neglect all the half-elves that were rolled when they were an intermediate compromise between the two. In effect, there is now the most reason to be human, there is some reason to be elven, and there is little to no reason to be half-elven as a druid.

I've since made my peace with the fact that it isn't going to get changed, but I thought I'd explain my reasoning to you.

Quite frankly, I dont understand why Guilds don't work the same way as Groups.

If a neutral or evil human is allowed to group with Evils, why can't they Guild with them?

Quite frankly, I think that humans should be allowed to Group/Guild with Evils or Goodies, but not both. Unfortunately, this means that a Human who starts off in WD and gets most low-level help from Good races would not be able to group with Evils ever, and hence never be allowed to join an Evil guild. Now, this is where RP would kick in - perhaps through some amazing RP story, a character could switch his/her allegiance from the Forces of Light to the Dark Side later in life - their significant other was slain and they sold their soul to some Evil God to get revenge... Whatever.

The point is, rather than having Humans be able to "switch sides" whenever they feel like it, which would really wreak havoc if racewars are implemented ever, they should be forced to choose Evil or Good, maybe at level 30 or something. Once their basic allegiance was made, it would take a literal "Act of God" (RP) to change. It's like religion in real life.

rer wrote:Quite frankly, I dont understand why Guilds don't work the same way as Groups.

If a neutral or evil human is allowed to group with Evils, why can't they Guild with them?

Quite frankly, I think that humans should be allowed to Group/Guild with Evils or Goodies, but not both. Unfortunately, this means that a Human who starts off in WD and gets most low-level help from Good races would not be able to group with Evils ever, and hence never be allowed to join an Evil guild. Now, this is where RP would kick in - perhaps through some amazing RP story, a character could switch his/her allegiance from the Forces of Light to the Dark Side later in life - their significant other was slain and they sold their soul to some Evil God to get revenge... Whatever.

The point is, rather than having Humans be able to "switch sides" whenever they feel like it, which would really wreak havoc if racewars are implemented ever, they should be forced to choose Evil or Good, maybe at level 30 or something. Once their basic allegiance was made, it would take a literal "Act of God" (RP) to change. It's like religion in real life.

Which completely defeats the purpose of allowing humans to group with Evils, which was to give Evils more of a pool of PC's to form a group with and to give humans some sort of racial advantage. Not that your point's not valid, just saying that there was a reason behind allowing neutral/evil humans to group with Evils to begin with. :D

I agree with you on that one Birile - I know why humans were allowed to group with evils in the first place, and agree with the decision too. But if Humans are allowed to do so, it should be more RP based, ie: Alignment, imho. Either way, however, if Humans are allowed to Group with Evil Races, regardless of restrictions to doing so, I just don't understand the point of now allowing them to Guild as well.

From a racewar perspective, the humans grouping with Evils are essentially "Choosing Sides" and should have to live with that decision. They are a neutral race because they have no inherent Good/Evil "switch" - it's something that they develop through life and upbringing.

rer wrote:I agree with you on that one Birile - I know why humans were allowed to group with evils in the first place, and agree with the decision too. But if Humans are allowed to do so, it should be more RP based, ie: Alignment, imho. Either way, however, if Humans are allowed to Group with Evil Races, regardless of restrictions to doing so, I just don't understand the point of now allowing them to Guild as well.

From a racewar perspective, the humans grouping with Evils are essentially "Choosing Sides" and should have to live with that decision. They are a neutral race because they have no inherent Good/Evil "switch" - it's something that they develop through life and upbringing.

Sometimes tightening the reigns for RP purposes is a bad thing. I don't see many people rolling Humans to group with just Evils. If someone wanted to group with just evils they are more likely to roll an Evilrace character to begin with. Granted, there are exceptions. Too, you fail to recognize that a Neutral race is a Neutral race. What I mean by that is, they do not choose sides and live with it, as you say. They're neutral for a reason. If they chose a side permanently they would be Good or Evil.

Birile wrote: you fail to recognize that a Neutral race is a Neutral race. What I mean by that is, they do not choose sides and live with it, as you say. They're neutral for a reason. If they chose a side permanently they would be Good or Evil.

So Humans shouldn't be able to group with goodraces either then?

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Birile wrote: you fail to recognize that a Neutral race is a Neutral race. What I mean by that is, they do not choose sides and live with it, as you say. They're neutral for a reason. If they chose a side permanently they would be Good or Evil.

So Humans shouldn't be able to group with goodraces either then?

I didn't say that at all. I'm saying they shouldn't be forced to permanently choose a side, ie. only grouping with Goods or only grouping with Evils for the life of their character. That's why they're Neutralrace. I personally never liked the idea of any humans being able to group with Evils--for reasons that don't fit this thread, so I'll just leave it at that--but if we're going to allow the option, I'm saying a Neutralrace character shouldn't be expected to choose one side permanently 'cause they're Neutral--they're not simply Goodrace, they're not simply Evilrace.

All I'm saying is that if humans are to be allowed to group with both, they should be allowed to guild with both. If they are not allowed to group with one, the shouldnt be allowed to group with the other either. And quite frankly, as a neutral race, their ability to group with either one should be alignment dependant. Evil humans shouldnt be allowed to group with good races, and vice versa. For humans to maintain their neutrality, they should be forced to remain neutral alignment, or pigeon hole themselves.

After writing that out, I can understand the reasoning behind humans not being able to be guilded by an Evil Guild - they could swing to good alignment (Izan's anyone?) which would preclude their ability to group with evils even (under my system, heh). Of course, I still think the reverse should be true - as neutrals, they should either have to choose a side, or take none at all (ie: Guild one way or the other, or not at all).

rer wrote:All I'm saying is that if humans are to be allowed to group with both, they should be allowed to guild with both. If they are not allowed to group with one, the shouldnt be allowed to group with the other either. And quite frankly, as a neutral race, their ability to group with either one should be alignment dependant. Evil humans shouldnt be allowed to group with good races, and vice versa. For humans to maintain their neutrality, they should be forced to remain neutral alignment, or pigeon hole themselves.

After writing that out, I can understand the reasoning behind humans not being able to be guilded by an Evil Guild - they could swing to good alignment (Izan's anyone?) which would preclude their ability to group with evils even (under my system, heh). Of course, I still think the reverse should be true - as neutrals, they should either have to choose a side, or take none at all (ie: Guild one way or the other, or not at all).

By this logic, then, wouldn't Halflings, Gnomes, etc. have to "only" group with evilraces if they were evil aligned, though? There's a difference between alignment and race--a Goodrace character can be Evil aligned, etc. That doesn't make them Evilrace, just Evil aligned. Therefore, why should a Neutralrace character be forced to make that sort of distinction?

They would have to make that distinction specifically because they are neutral race. Good races are inherently good - unfortunately Toril does not allow for Chaotic Good or Lawful Evil, which is where I see an "Evil Gnome" or "Good Orc". Of course, that's just a matter of interpretation.

I do not see how an elf or gnome..dwarf, whatever would knowingly clan with a spineless human that can't make up what side of the fence he sits on. Sure it's great for the human, but it doesn't make sense for the mud :P